Mets no longer getting Petco'd at own ballpark

In an image provided by the New York Mets on Monday, Oct. 31, 2011, a graphic shows the planned changes to the field dimensions at Citi Field for next season. In an effort to boost scoring at the pitcher-friendly ballpark, the Mets announced Monday they are cutting the field dimensions by as much as 12 feet next season, lowering the fence height to 8 feet all around and changing the fence color to blue with an orange line at the top. (AP Photo/New York Mets)
— AP

In an image provided by the New York Mets on Monday, Oct. 31, 2011, a graphic shows the planned changes to the field dimensions at Citi Field for next season. In an effort to boost scoring at the pitcher-friendly ballpark, the Mets announced Monday they are cutting the field dimensions by as much as 12 feet next season, lowering the fence height to 8 feet all around and changing the fence color to blue with an orange line at the top. (AP Photo/New York Mets)
/ AP

Scott Hairston's drive bounced off the big wall in left, maybe a foot below the lip. Instead of having to pick up his step in a dash for second, Hairston slowed his stride to a trot.

Clearly, the New York Mets cleanup hitter was savoring not only the fact that his three-run homer off Clayton Richard launched his club to a victory during the Padres visit, but the fact that it was a homer at all. A year ago, it would not have been. At most other ballparks, yes, but not at Citi Field. And definitely not at, well, you know where else.

Indeed, only an hour before that game, Hairston literally was shaking his head at the memory of a similar blast when he was with the Padres. The shot fairly screamed “walk-off” as it soared toward the wall in left-center at Petco Park.

“I hit it square, hit it with everything I had, hit it as good as I could hit a ball,” he said. “I’m watching it go out, thinking, “That’s it. Game over.’ ”

So why was the center fielder still running? Oh yeah. Petco.

“My heart dropped when he caught it,” said Hairston. “Oh, man, that was painful.”

Word got back to New York quickly enough that the Padres finally are giving serious consideration to bringing in their own fences, just as the Mets did at Citi Field after last season..

“When I came here a couple times as a visitor with Padres, it was reminiscent of Petco,” said Hairston, referring to Citi Field’s opening season of 2009. “Obviously, it’s a lot better now with the walls brought in.”

Sandy Alderson concurs. Wholeheartedly.

As CEO of the Padres, remember, Alderson was in charge when they did bring in the fences at Petco Park. OK, fence, a small section of it. Originally measured at 411 feet, a stretch in right-center was shaved to 400 feet, and that’s still a poke for any power hitter.

Alderson, then, had heard it all before when he moved to New York and became general manager of the Mets in 2010. He got a daily earful of the squawking from within his own clubhouse, the groans from fans after Mets home runs died in visiting outfielders’ gloves. Fact is, given his experience in San Diego, Alderson had sharpened his own opinion about too-big ballparks.

“Baseball purists might think that 2-1 or 3-2 or 1-0 night in and night out is the best form of baseball entertainment, but most people don’t,” said Alderson. “Me, personally? If I had to watch a game that was 1-0 or 2-1 every night, I’d move to England.”

If they do decide to shrink their ballpark, the Padres can learn from the Mets, who actually managed to go smaller while not really hurting the aesthetics. Much as the Padres did at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium, the Mets basically built an inner fence, but they effectively merged it with the original wall that rises as high as 16 feet.

The inner fence is just eight feet tall, enabling players to produce what one Mets official called the “Endy Chavez moment,” the leap-and-catch to rob hitters of home runs.

Moreover, the Mets turned a negative into a positive by creating a “Party Center Deck,” a platform constructed between the short wall and the big wall in left. Fans watch the game standing on the deck, leaning on a rail to hang over the field and share their, er, kindnesses with visiting players. Behind the shortened see-through fence in right, fans closest to the action watch from dugout-like benches.

The only dimensions left unchanged were the left- and right-field corners (333 feet) and straightaway center (408). Moved in as much as 12 feet in places, the distances range from 358 to 385 feet in left/left-center, 375 to 390 in right/right-center.

Now get this. Home runs are down at Citi Field this season. Only the Padres and San Francisco Giants -- big ballpark -- have hit fewer homers this season than the Mets.

“The practical matter of changing the fences has changed things, but not in sheer numbers,” said Alderson. “We haven’t hit that many homers, home or away. But had we not brought the fences in, little less than half the home runs that were hit in the park would not have been home runs.”

The Mets got their long-awaited power surge in one of the Padres games. None of New York’s three homers that day cleared the old wall.

“When all is said and done at the end of the year, there’s going to be a significant change in home-run totals and offensive production,” said Hairston. “It might not be that big of a difference now, but it’s only two months into the season, April was cool and it’s starting to get hot.”

Just the excitement and optimism in Hairston’s voice represents a major improvement in the New York players’ collective psyche. That’s not lost on Padres hitters, who are tired of talking about Petco’s size, but far more weary of its negative effects on their offensive numbers.

“This belief that something biased strongly in one direction or the other lends to a home-field advantage is nonsense,” said Alderson. “Given the fact that half the games are played elsewhere, particularly with hitters who have to play 81 games in a place like this, it causes them to fundamentally change their mental and physical approach, which then can be carried on elsewhere.

“Visitors come here, however, and don’t change anything. They do what they do and they leave. So that intimidation factor is suffered more by the home hitters in this case than the visitors.”

The greatest argument for the larger ballparks is that they’re built for pitching, which is less expensive for a club to maintain than hitting, and economics certainly figure mightily into the Padres’ reticence to mess with the dimensions. For obvious reason, the Padres have become even more of a pitching-minded organization since the debut of Petco in 2004, a year before Alderson took charge of the franchise.

Since coming to the Mets, though, Alderson has heard a theory on that that makes sense to him.

“Our pitching coach felt that a ballpark that forgiving to pitchers leads to bad habits,” said Alderson, “that guys aren’t as good out of Citi Field because they come to rely on the ballpark to bail them out of certain situations that they’re not able to deal with on the road.”